d be prudent to put him quietly out of the way," he suggested,
the thin lips closing cruelly. "No, hold him, we may have further need
for his sword. But have a care that he talks to no one."

Madame had raised no objection to the Duke's cool command that an end
be made of Yvard, yet I did her the credit to suppose it was because
she well knew she might do as she liked, and he be none the wiser.

He now settled himself upon a divan near Madame, with all the
complacency of a man whose own foresight has saved him a serious
trouble, and said after mature deliberation, gazing thoughtfully at the
sportive cherubs on the ceiling:

"Well, it could not have been so bad after all, for I observed the
caution to prepare a warning for our friends across the frontier, and
had arranged for a friend of ours to be entrapped by Orleans, betraying
misleading dispatches to him. A fine plan, think you? Menezes you
know is devoted to me, and I have promised him a patent."

"Who did your grace say was to be this friend?"

"Menezes."

"Why Menezes?"

"I have done much for the fellow, and he is not over clever; clever
enough for the purpose, you know, but--"

"Does my lord not remember Menezes is a brother of the Perrault whom
you had hanged some years ago? I fear you have been badly advised."

"No! I do not recall him."

"The rogue who cast a stone at your horse?"

"Ah, I bring him to mind. Short, thick-set fellow, who whined
something about hunger, children, and the cold. Ugh! What concern
have I with the rabble? But how do you know this, Celeste?"

"I have long misdoubted him, and had the rascal overlooked. He is of
Picardy, and his father was attached to St. Andre, who likes not His
Grace, the Duke of Maine."

"No, by my faith, he hates me. Ah, I see it all. Celeste, you should
have been a man, a man's wit almost you have. Really, so much brain is
wasted in that pretty head of yours. Madame will come to comprehend
she does not know it all--yet she torments me till I give in. I think
I shall take firmer hold, and manage my own affairs to better advantage
than she. Ugh! What a scrape she was like to get me in."

He gradually regained the expression of complete satisfaction with
himself, and prepared now to show the masterpiece of his work, the
contract with Antonio of Modena, the money-lender.

"Here are our financial plans; the usury is high, but there is great
risk, so thinks Antonio; egad! perhaps he is